Boundary Slip and Surface Interaction: A Lattice Boltzmann Simulation

The factors affecting slip length in Couette geometry flows are analysed by means of a two-phase mesoscopic lattice Boltzmann model including non-ideal fluid-fluid and fluid-wall interactions. The main factors influencing the boundary slip are the strength of interactions between fluid-fluid and fluid-wall particles. Other factors, such as fluid viscosity, bulk pressure may also change the slip length. We find that boundary slip only occurs under a certain density (bulk pressure). If the density is large enough, the slip length will tend to zero. In our simulations, a low density layer near the wall does not need to be postulated a priori but emerges naturally from the underlying non-ideal mesoscopic dynamics. It is the low density layer that induces the boundary slip. The results may be helpful to understand recent experimental observations on the slippage of micro flows.